


Indigo Nights

by Sylverstia



Series: Hanging by a thread [4]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Whump, i dunno what this is...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-06
Updated: 2019-08-06
Packaged: 2020-08-10 19:21:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20140672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sylverstia/pseuds/Sylverstia
Summary: Follow up to Chariots of Silk.Maybe don't take an android onto a carnival ride.





	Indigo Nights

**Author's Note:**

> this is purely self indulgent.. bear with me. haha

Silvy chuckled when he stumbled out of the exit of the ride. Her head felt light, dizziness had settled in. It would pass soon, but Sixty looked a bit sick.

“You good?”

He tried to shake his head, then stopped and grabbed on to her. “…I don’t think that was a good idea.”

She grasped his arm and guided him to a nearby bench. He settled down heavily, eyes unfocused and wild.

“Just sit for a moment. You feeling sick?”

He grimaced. “I don’t have a reference for that.”

She pursed her lips and settled her hand on his sternum. “Weird feeling here?”

His nod her snort. “Me too. It’ll go away in a bit.”

“Are you sure?”

She shrugged. “We’ll see. Probably from all the food tumbling around in us.”

He scrunched up his nose in disgust and slowly got back to his feet. “I’d like to go home… if that’s okay with you.”

She nodded eagerly and was at his side again. Slowly they walked back to the entrance of the fair. Sixty was painfully slow and stopped every few meters. He kept squeezing his eyes shut, while Silvy was feeling significantly better already. Was it different for androids? Coming to think of it, she had never heard for YK500 getting sick at carnivals. Was it just the modified system that gave him trouble?

Thirty painfully slow minutes later they had made it to her apartment, and he swayed violently when she pressed the button for the elevator.

“Six, run a diagnostic for me, okay?”

His LED had been yellow the whole time, now it was spinning, stuttered, stopped and flicked back into a steady yellow.

“Everything within normal parameters.”

She frowned but nodded. “Just not used to the rides, huh?”

“It would appear so.”

He beelined for the couch when they entered the apartment and buried himself under the blankets without even turning the lights on. Sylvia had a strange feeling about it. It was barely eight in the evening, and he usually didn’t power down until she headed to bed. He was definitely not feeling well.

But why? Androids were supposed to withstand much more than the force they had been exposed to on the ride.

Frowning she headed over to him after flicking the kitchen lights on. He wasn’t overheating, but something was still off. His breath was shallow and fast, despite not needing to cool his systems. Eyes pressed shut, legs drawn to his chest and arms curled around them.

“Six?” she whispered, frowned when he didn’t acknowledge her.

He didn’t even flinch when she placed her hand on his cheek. His skin felt cold and a spike of fear pierced her.

Androids were always warm. No matter what they did they would have a temperature close to a human body.

Sixty had had issues with temperature regulations since she had met him, but not like this. He would have told her about it. Asked for a warmer blanket, a thicker shirt. Maybe a hot water bottle. He wouldn’t have been silent.

Concerned she stood and went into the kitchen to call her sister while she filled the electric kettle and turned it on.

The call didn’t take long to be accepted. “’Sup.” Cindy greeted her. The cheery voice almost made Silvy forget her worry.

“I got a question.”

“Shoot.”

Worrying her lip, she waited for the water to heat up, kept glancing back to the android on her couch.

“…Did you ever take Avery on a ride? Like a rollercoaster or something?”

She could practically hear the confused frown when her sister replied, “All the time. Why?”

“…He’s fine afterwards?”

“Sometimes a bit queasy. Passes soon, what you wanna take Six on a ride? Thought you didn’t like them.”

Silvy wedged the phone between her shoulder and her ear and filled the hot water into the hot water bottle. She almost felt guilty when she screwed it shut and headed into the living room.

“We already did. But he’s weird. He’s cold, unresponsive, tense… I think something’s wrong, but his diagnostics couldn’t find anything.”

“You home?”

“Yes.” Silvy nodded as she moved the blanket away from the android and shoved the warm water bottle between his chest and his drawn-up legs. He shuddered at the warmth but gave no other reaction.

“I’ll stop by in a few minutes.”

When the call disconnected, she settled down on the floor, faced him and waited. Either for him to show any reaction, or for her sister to arrive. Whatever came first.

Cindy unlocked the door just three minutes later, giving the impression that she was already in the area.

“Where’s the lame duck?” she whispered as she walked into the kitchen with her cyberlife issued suitcase and a white paper bag with the cyberlife logo on it.

Silvy only turned to look at her, made no move to leave the android. “I really don’t know what’s going on with him.”

“That’s what you have me for. Scoot.”

Silvy stood to make space for her sister, watched as the technician checked for visual clues to his condition. She rambled to herself, all things Silvy had already noticed.

“He didn’t enter stasis.” Cindy muttered more to herself than to her sister. “Six, I’m not sure if you can respond to me right now but I know you can hear me.” She told the android. “I’m going to connect a diagnostic unit. Same as I did in the station, okay?”

As expected, there was no visible response, but Cindy slowly proceeded and sighed when she pulled up the files on a tablet. “No wonder he’s like that. Thirium supply 35% contaminated.”

“What-?” Sylvia tried to force the lance of fear away. “How… why would that happen?”

“It’s my fault.” Cindy hissed as she opened her suitcase and put four bottles of thirium on the coffee table. The plastic bottles clattered against the smooth surface and Silvy resisted the urge to move her ceramic mug away from the edge.

“Should have checked that when I looked him over. He had extensive system damage; lines open for who knew how long. Of course, there’d be stuff in there.”

“How do we fix this?”

Cindy dug into her suitcase again, took out a foam inlay and opened a zipper pouch attached to the side of the casing. In it were filled syringes without needles. They all had clear fluid inside them and were marked with blue triangles.

“It’s been a pretty consistent issue lately.” Cindy continued. “Lots of damaged androids who turn up with contaminated thirium supplies. Most of the time that issue fixes itself, with purges. But here it’s a different issue.”

“Why?”

Cindy gave her a humorless smile. “Guy’s got a stomach. There’s no direct connection to his thirium supply, so he can’t purge it.”

Sylvia sighed. That as least made sense. It made her wonder why he had brought up thirium on the first day he stayed here, but that wasn’t important now.

“I’m going to check for damaged lines now.” Cindy muttered and grabbed a lamp from her case. “Six, can you deactivate the overlay? We’re gonna take your clothing off so I can check for damaged thirium lines. We won’t do anything else.”

Silvy shivered when the skin overlay retreated. So he was online and listening to their conversation. It was almost eerie. Together the two sisters undressed him, and Cindy laid him flat on the couch. Silvy’s eyes were drawn between his legs for a moment. She knew what would be there, he had explained it, although not in much detail. Still it was strange not to see the smooth nothing that most other androids had for a crotch.

Rage filled her at the thought. Why the hell had anyone thought it necessary to modify an android like that? Especially one that was never meant for intimacy?!

As Cindy checked him over with the lamp to find damaged thirium lines, Silvy wandered into the kitchen for coffee. She brewed a new pot, hoping it would buy her some time. She didn’t want to see what was going on.

Her hands were shaking, and her eyes burned. And the pot of coffee was done way sooner than she would have liked.

She took her time to fill two mugs and slowly headed back to her sister.

Cindy readily accepted the mug and took two gulps of the scalding hot liquid without much regard for the temperature. “No broken lines. That’s good.” She told her sister.

Silvy only nodded, settled down on her beanbag and continued to watch. “So how do you clean this mess up?”

“We gonna put that into his system every three hours and clear the filters in the morning.” Cindy nodded to the packaged syringes on the table. “Gonna be a long night.”

Silvy shrugged. She could deal with that, if it meant hat Sixty would be okay.

The technician pulled the blanket over the android’s exposed body and sighed. “Six, I’ll put you into stasis for a few hours. Your panic is taxing your system and it’s better to do this when the thirium pump is beating in a normal rhythm. “

Silvy saw numbers spike on her sister’s tablet, despite the android not physically reacting to it. “Cindy!” she hissed at her sister.

“I’m stating the facts.”

The older of the two got off the beanbag and settled down on the floor next to the couch again. She gripped Sixty’s hand and ran her other through his hair. “It’s okay.” She reassured. “I’ll be with you the whole time.”

She kept her glare on her sister when she initiated the forced stasis and only backed away when the technician threatened to shove her aside.

“We’ve done this before.” Cindy muttered in her direction when she moved the blanket off Sixty’s chest and opened an access panel under the collar bone.

“We did?”

“With Marley way back. When he nosedived into your pond.”

Silvy cringed at the memory. She had buried it deep in her mind, never to be touched again. But there it was. Marley tripping over the hose and scratching his arms at the sharp stones in the pond, nearly poking his eyes out and contaminating his thirium supply with algae and fish food.

She had to pull him out and call Cindy back then too. Now that she thought about it, it was a quite similar situation. Although Marley’s case was easier to solve. Cindy had put the strange liquid into his system too. But only once.

It was still strange to see her sister pull a thin thirium line from the inside of Sixty’s chassis. It had a latch on it, seemingly designed for purposes such as this. Cindy connected another clear line to the latch and unpacked one of the syringes.

“It’s just collecting all the gunk and transporting it to the filters. Ideally.”

“…ideally…” Silvy echoed.

“Well, if that doesn’t work, we have to take him to a facility and switch out all of his thirium.”

“Great.”

“Uh huh. So, let’s hope it works. The only other RK800 I worked on was Connor, and honestly, he’s been giving me the least issues.”

Silvy sighed and grabbed her coffee mug as her sister pushed the contents of the syringe into the thirium line.

“Do all androids have this… weird line thing there?”

Cindy shook her head. “Connor doesn’t. I’m surprised Six does. But he’s a later model. Maybe they were tired of scrapping them every time something went wrong. Cory has it too.”

“The RK900… right?”

“Yup.”

The older of the two stared out to the terrace for a moment, absentmindedly noted that it had started to rain.

“And now we wait.” Cindy announced as she places the empty syringe aside.

She stood and grabbed the white paper-bag she had brought with her. “I was going to head to your place anyway, because I got you something.” He grinned when she handed Sylvia two boxes from the bag.

“…What, why?”

Cindy shrugged. “I did forget your birthday, so I wanted to make up for it.”

“You apologized and brought me cake; I think that’s more than enough making up.” Silvy chuckled and unlatched the cardboard lid of the smaller box. When she opened it, a stack of drawings were revealed, unmistakably made by children, some scrawled and some quite detailed, all with the tell-tale childlike style to it.

“Matt and Avery complained about never seeing their aunt lately. Ave pestered me into bringing these over.”

Silvy grinned as she slowly looked through the stack. There were a few pictures of her, then of the dog Cindy owned. Ugo. Family pictures, dinosaurs, buildings. “These are so cute.”

“I honestly don’t know where to put them anymore, I’m glad they decided to give you some.”

Silvy lifted the stack of drawings away from the box and placed them on the coffee table. Underneath there was a tablet, definitely the latest model with all the fancy things one could desire.

“Cindy?”

Cindy shrugged sheepishly. “Listen. You got a state-of-the-art android and you have no way to look at his diagnostics. That’s dangerous. And you can watch movies on there too.”

“I haven’t watched a movie in years.”

“Exactly. It’s time.”

Silvy laughed silently. “Thank you.” She set the box aside to look at the bigger one underneath. It was just as unlabeled as the other, but when she opened it bright pops of color assaulted her. “Mark cleared out the basement.” Cindy explained.

Silvy eyed the red box wearily. She recognized the characters on the package, frowned deeply at it. “Cindy… I haven’t… I don’t even… Doesn’t he want this anymore?”

Her sister grimaced. “They stopped making games for the switch, ages ago.” She nodded at the paper bag. “He wanted to get you ‘into gaming’.”

Silvy peered into the bag and noticed copious amounts of Nintendo Switch games stacked neatly into the space the two packages hadn’t taken up.

“Might also give him something to do.” Cindy nodded at Sixty.

“I don’t even have a TV!” Silvy whispered loudly. “Dummy, it had its own screen. Did you forget?”

“Oh… right.”

Cindy shook her head and cleared the boxes into the paper bag after they had taken out all the games from it. Together they made space on the coffee table and set up the console while they waited for the three hours to pass.

Silvy was pleasantly surprised that the console still worked, despite her sister reassuring her that it was in top condition. They busied themselves with playing old games that neither of them had touched in decades. And the three hours passed almost too quickly.

Cindy administered the second dose of whatever it was in the syringes, and Silvy watched. As expected, nothing really happened.

“He’s going to be in stasis for at least to more hours.” Cindy explained. “Think you can do the next two? I got a meeting tomorrow…. Normally I’d get away with sleeping in the lab but…”

Silvy nodded. “This isn’t super complicated… just… push the stuff in every three hours.”

“Slowly. But yeah that’s he gist.” Cindy suppressed a yawn and stretched as she got up. “I’ll kidnap your bed.”

“Be gentle, it might bite back.”

Cindy scoffed as she disappeared into the bedroom. “Ha. Ha.”

When the door shut, Silvy turned back to the console. She wasn’t sure if she enjoyed playing these games. Th nostalgia was strong but there had been a reason for her to get rid of most of her devices. Still, it was a welcome distraction from the ever-looming issue going on with Sixty at the moment.

Maybe she could even stay awake all night. But just in case she set an alarm on her phone and continued to play.

When the alarm rang, she jumped. She had fallen asleep after all, the game over screen of super Mario blaring at her while she slowly peeled herself off the ground. The syringe was unpacked quickly and it didn’t take much effort to attach it to the tube, but when she set to push the contents into the line, green eyes suddenly snapped at her, and without warning, Sixty darted off the couch, tripped over the cables of the console, ripped it off the table and squeezed himself into the corner of the wall and her bookshelf.

Eyes wide, breath fast, almost wheezing. “Six-“ She started.

His arms were pressed against his chest, hit the exposed panel. He tried to speak but all that escaped him was a choked sob. LED red, panic clear in his face. She crouched down, made no move towards him.

“Sixty…” she forced her voice to stay calm, even though she wanted to scream, run over to him, hug him. She had scared the hell out of him, it seemed.

“Cindy put you in stasis, remember?”

He blinked at her a few times, gulped in air as if there wasn’t enough in the room. His whole frame was trembling, and he had squeezed himself so far into the corner that she feared he would bring the whole bookshelf down on himself.

He then noticed the attached syringe and grabbed it with a sound that was almost a scream. He jumped to his feet, knocked over a vase and a few books as he tried to run. Silvy cursed internally when she realized she hadn’t locked the front door. If he didn’t calm down soon, there would be an even bigger problem.

“Six!” she yelled now. He flinched, whined with a panicked sob, and darted to the door to the hallway. He tripped over the beanbag and Silvy jumped back to her feet, ran over to him and grabbed his arms. He struggled against her grip but was uncoordinated and confused as she brought his arms to his chest and held him in place. It did nothing to drown out his panicked screams.

The noise had alerted her sister who stood in the door to the bedroom, hair a wild mess and eyes confused.

“Stay where you are.” Silvy snarled at her as she struggled to keep Sixty still before he hurt himself or anyone else.

“Holy shit what’s going on-“

Silvy ignored her sister, used her legs to straddle Sixty into place and held on to him. “Breathe.” She whispered. “You’re in my apartment, you’re sitting on the orange carpet. I got you, Six. It’s okay.”

He kept struggling against her in jerking movements, but the attempts quickly became halfhearted and sluggish.

Suddenly, as if all energy had been sapped from him, he deflated against her, back of his head resting against her shoulder as he sucked in shallow breaths. His arms sank to the ground and tears streamed down his face. His teeth were chattering while his whole body shook violently.

“Shit…” Cindy hissed from her spot at the door and grabbed the blanket from the couch.

When she wanted to put it over the android, Silvy stopped her.

“Six,” she whispered, “Cindy’s gonna put the blanket over you, okay?”

He swallowed hard before he nodded, and Cindy slowly brought the blanket across his body. There was no movement from him apart from the shaking and the frantic breaths that only slowly calmed down.

“What the hell happened?” Cindy asked silently as she crouched down.

“Sorry… I’m sorry.” Sixty hissed, voice barely audible. “I- I… didn’t mean… I thought-”

Silvy shook her head. “It’s okay.”

They slowly got him back to the couch, this time lying on his side, half covered by the blanket. Silvy resumed running her hand trough his hair and sighed.

Cindy put the console back on the table, made a comment on how surprised she was that it didn’t break and administered the contents of the syringe properly. Now that Sixty knew what was going on, he was significantly calmer, but his LED hadn’t stopped being yellow.

“Wanna do the next one yourself? That’s decidedly less scary for all of us.” Cindy muttered and suppressed a yawn.

He nodded quickly, almost as if he was waiting for the question to be asked. “…I apologize for that…. Violent reaction.”

Cindy gave him a humorless smile. “You were scared, that’s fine.”

“I broke another of your vases.” He directed at Silvy.

She shrugged. “So what, I’m just glad you’re okay.”

He shuddered and buried his face in the pillow. “Thank you… for… breaking me out of the loop again.”

“Of course. As often as I need to.”


End file.
